Henry Eric Beissel is a writer and editor who has published 16 volumes of poetry, six books of plays, a non-fiction book on Canada, two anthologies of plays intended for use in high schools, and numerous essays and pieces of short fiction. He first came to national attention with the controversial literary/political journal Edge. Beissel has received several awards: the first was the Norma Epstein Award for Creative Writing in 1958 at University of Toronto, the last the Walter-Bauer Literaturpreis, Merseburg [Germany], 1994.